file sharing – Fortunehttp://fortune.com
Fortune 500 Daily & Breaking Business NewsFri, 09 Dec 2016 15:28:56 +0000enhourly1http://wordpress.com/http://1.gravatar.com/blavatar/dab01945b542bffb69b4f700d7a35f8f?s=96&d=http%3A%2F%2Fs2.wp.com%2Fi%2Fbuttonw-com.pngfile sharing – Fortunehttp://fortune.com
Fortunehttps://s0.wp.com/wp-content/themes/vip/fortune/assets/images/fortunelogo.pnghttp://fortune.com25040Google and Box Tighten Tieshttp://fortune.com/2016/09/07/google-and-box-tighten-ties/
http://fortune.com/2016/09/07/google-and-box-tighten-ties/#respondWed, 07 Sep 2016 20:02:23 +0000http://fortune.com/?p=1789285]]>Google and Box box, two companies that already have worked to make sure their respective products work well with each other, said Wednesday that they would take that relationship a step further.

First, they’ll ensure that Box’s cloud file repository can more easily store files created in Google goog Apps, according to a statement. To be fair, Google Apps users could already store what they wanted in Box. But, behind-the-scenes there are several steps in the process, which take time to negotiate, said Aaron Levie, chief executive of Box.

“We can improve and speed up that process,” he told Fortune in an interview after his keynote at Box’s conference in San Francisco.

Second, another joint project will make sure that the Google Springboard service that lets businesses search Gmail and Google Apps files will also search content stored in Box. (Google Springboard replaces a hardware search appliance that Google discontinued last year. )

Levie told Fortune that both projects should be completed in the next few quarters.

Box, which rose to prominence by selling file sharing and collaboration to business customers, gives Google another toehold in the enterprise market, where the Internet search giant is trying to expand its presence both with Apps and cloud services sold to IT professionals. And Google Apps, widely used in small and medium companies, along with some big companies, may also give Box entry into some new accounts that may otherwise use Dropbox or Google Drive, for that matter.

Wednesday’s news comes a day after Box announced Box Relay, a collaboration with IBMibm, that it says will streamline some work-related processes like sales approvals that need to be approved by multiple people. That product is expected by the fourth quarter

For more on Box, watch:

Levie, who shared the stage with Google senior vice president Diane Greene, hinted at more future Google collaborations. That’s a good thing since some of us expected Box to name Google Cloud Platform as another public cloud partner. It’s already using Amazonamzn Web Services and Microsoftmsft Azure in addition to its own data centers.

]]>http://fortune.com/2016/09/07/google-and-box-tighten-ties/feed/0Fortune Brainstorm TECH 2014- Aaron LeviebarbaraadarrowBitTorrent Launches Live Streaming News Networkhttp://fortune.com/2016/07/13/bittorrent-news-network/
http://fortune.com/2016/07/13/bittorrent-news-network/#respondWed, 13 Jul 2016 17:00:01 +0000http://fortune.com/?p=1732830]]>BitTorrent, a streaming-technology company more closely associated with file-sharing than journalism, announced on Wednesday that it is launching a live-streaming TV news network that the company says will be an “informed, independent voice on the news.”

The new network will go live on July 18 at the Republican National Convention in Cleveland, Ohio. It is being led by news director Harrison Bohrman, a former producer with Vice’s TV network Viceland and before that a writer and producer with CNN, who was recently hired by BitTorrent.

In addition to Bohrman, the company says its team on the ground for the political conventions will include several former reporters and producers from Al Jazeera America, including former chief political correspondent Michael Shure, reporter James Reinl, and producer Rita Chan. Al Jazeera America shut down earlier this year.

“Television news has been stagnating for some time,” Erik Schwartz, vice president of media for BitTorrent, said in a statement. “It's having trouble appealing to a generation that grew up online. We are using superior data and tools and the Silicon Valley ethos of lean startup to build a nimble news organization that will learn quickly from user behavior.”

The company says its convention coverage will include play-by-play commentary on all developments and speeches, along with guest commentary, and that it will provide 10 to 12 hours of live coverage every day, starting with 2 hours of live programming in the morning.

“We are marrying the Internet's principles of open access to information with society's need for unfettered--and unfiltered--access to news,” said Jeremy Johnson, co-CEO of BitTorrent.

The company, whose main claim to fame is a peer-to-peer file-sharing technology that makes it easy to distribute and download large files, launched a streaming video service called BitTorrent Live in May that is available on the Apple TV.

In addition to the company’s news channel, the video service includes alternative networks and content providers such as Clubbing TV, FightBox, Newsmax TV, Heroes TV, and TWiT. BitTorrent says its P2P technology allows it to scale faster and distribute content more easily than traditional TV companies.

]]>http://fortune.com/2016/07/13/bittorrent-news-network/feed/0BitTorrent LiveMathewDropbox Promises It Is Finally Headed Toward Profitabilityhttp://fortune.com/2016/06/15/dropbox-pushes-for-profit/
http://fortune.com/2016/06/15/dropbox-pushes-for-profit/#respondWed, 15 Jun 2016 13:57:43 +0000http://fortune.com/?p=1699640]]>Dropbox, the file sharing and storage company, is apparently getting serious about business--and making money. The company was valued at $10 billion two years ago, but that number has been called into question in recent months as have those sky-high valuations of Palantir, Xiaomi, and other high-flying startups.

On Tuesday, Dropbox chief executive Drew Houston said that in what he called “the post-Unicorn era,” his company is focusing on business fundamentals. (A “unicorn” is the slang term in Silicon Valley for a startup valued at $1 billion.)

Those fundamentals include controlling spending in a push towards profitability. Costs, “can get away from you one day at a time; expenses that start small turn big," Houston told attendees of the Bloomberg Technology Conference this week, according to the San Francisco Business Times. “We’ll see which companies survive over the next 12 to 18 months.”

This is a big shift for tech startups, which have concentrated on user and market share growth--winning “eyeballs” and mind share--as opposed to paying customers and profits. In March, for example, Dropbox claimed 500 million users--but didn’t specify how many of them pay. The company offers a free option for up to two gigabytes of storage. Dropbox does claim 150,000 paying business customers.

For more on Dropbox Business watch:

Houston said the company is free-cash-flow positive, but not yet profitable. Free cash flow measures how much money a business generates from its operations after it pays for capital expenses. That cash can be used to pay for expansion or to cut debt. Net income, or what is commonly thought of as profit, on the other hand, is what’s left over after all operating expenses as well as interest and taxes are deducted from total revenue.

“Cash is oxygen. Even just being a dollar cash flow positive is a really critical threshold because it lets you control your destiny,” Houston said, according to Business Insider.

Get Data Sheet, Fortune's daily newsletter on the business of technology.

As for that elusive Dropbox initial public offering, Houston declined to talk timelines. Boxbox, a cloud storage and collaboration rival, went public early last year and has yet to turn a profit. Consumer tech giant Google goog (with Google Drive) and business behemoth Microsoftmsft (with OneDrive) also compete in this hotly-contested market but have other (huge) businesses to help fund their cloud storage offerings.

]]>http://fortune.com/2016/06/15/dropbox-pushes-for-profit/feed/0Dropbox Inc. Chief Executive Officer Drew Houston InterviewbarbaraadarrowApple Scoops Up Former Box Exechttp://fortune.com/2016/04/26/apple-hires-box-exec/
http://fortune.com/2016/04/26/apple-hires-box-exec/#respondTue, 26 Apr 2016 12:27:59 +0000http://fortune.com/?p=1637106]]>Karen Appleton, until last week a senior vice president at Box, is joining Apple, in a move first reported by Re/code.

Last week, as has become custom in the industry, she took to Medium to announce her exit from Box after nine years, but nothing about her destination. Box box provides cloud-based file storage and document sharing software.

According to Re/Code, Appleton will take on an “enterprise-focused” role at Apple aapl, which makes sense given that company’s renewed enterprise push working with partners including IBMibm and Ciscocsco.

Fortune reached out to Apple and Box for comment and will update this story as needed.

Box, unlike its rival Dropbox, has focused on business users from the get go. Its mantra is that businesses need ways for employees, partners, and suppliers to share and collaborate on documents in what it says is a secure but intuitive way. Just a few weeks ago IBM and Box announced plans to collaborate on business software for Apple iOS devices.

Apple is in an interesting position here. It is undoubtedly a darling among consumers: There are tons of fanboys who can’t wait to get their hands on its latest iPad, iPhone, even iWatch (although there are probably fewer of those).

That focus on slick devices helped Apple among PC-centric businesses where CEOs and other high-level execs brought their iPhones or iPads to work regardless of what IT departments had to say about it. Often those devices were not on the corporate approved list, but who’s going to say no to the boss?

The IBM and Cisco alliances are ways to get Apple devices into businesses through the front door, in an IT-sanctioned way. Appleton could probably help with that.

]]>http://fortune.com/2016/04/26/apple-hires-box-exec/feed/02015 Power Women Breakfast Portraits, The Wrap, November 3, 2015barbaraadarrowKanye West Outs Himself As Pirate Bay Userhttp://fortune.com/2016/03/02/kanye-west-pirate/
http://fortune.com/2016/03/02/kanye-west-pirate/#respondWed, 02 Mar 2016 08:52:25 +0000http://fortune.com/?p=1568807]]>Kanye West’s new album has been pirated many times, so maybe that’s why he’s enthusiastically browsing file-sharing sites?

West tweeted a screenshot of his browser, most prominently showing a Sufjan Stevens track playing in YouTubegoog, but also displaying other tabs including one for the Pirate Bay. Judging from that tab and those around it, it seems West was at least looking at a pirated copy of the $189 software synthesizer Serum.

Deadmau5, another famous producer, tweetedtwtr something quite rude at West in response, expressing surprise that he can’t afford to pay for the tool.

West chose to launch his The Life of Pablo album on the music-streaming service Tidal (also backed by Deadmau5) rather than put it out for sale, which is possibly why it was pirated half a million times in its first day of release. He was subsequently reported to be planning a chat with his lawyers over the money-sapping leak.

The rapper-producer recently claimed he was $53 million in debt and asked Facebookfb chief Mark Zuckerberg to invest $1 billion in his “ideas”. That apparently hasn’t happened yet.

]]>http://fortune.com/2016/03/02/kanye-west-pirate/feed/0kanye west snl 2016superglazeIs Dropbox planning to take on Google Docs?http://fortune.com/2015/04/03/dropbox-google-docs/
http://fortune.com/2015/04/03/dropbox-google-docs/#respondFri, 03 Apr 2015 22:23:45 +0000http://fortune.com/?p=1066245]]>File-sharing company Dropbox plans to take on Google Docs and Evernote with a new online word processing service. Or at least, it appears so.

The new product, Composer, surfaced today on Product Hunt, an online bulletin board for tech products, before Dropbox shut down access. Composer is an online notepad similar to Google Docs for creating documents, including the ability for group editing, according to one of several people who said they were able to access the service and who posted a screen shot.

Dropbox declined to comment about Composer, which may have leaked out accidentally before it was ready for a public premiere.

In developing the service, Dropbox appears to be challenging Google, whose online file-storage product Drive lets users create documents, spreadsheets, and presentations that are saved on its own servers rather than on the author’s computer. Group editing is one of Google Drive’s most useful and popular features. Rival online storage company Box already has an app called Notes for collaborating on documents while note-taking service Evernote offers a similar capability.

Dropbox has been battling on multiple fronts against competing online file storage providers like Box, Google Drive, Evernote and even Apple’s iCloud for quite some time. In the past year, the companies have all slashed prices, increased storage limits, and released new products like photo sharing from mobile phones and services that help third-party developers share data.

Dropbox had already signaled its interest in getting into online documents and editing tools. Nearly a year ago, it acquired Hackpad, a startup building a service for collaborating on documents, and which may have been the basis for Composer. Dropbox also recently acquired CloudOn, a startup whose apps originally made Microsoft Office documents accessible from mobile devices, but eventually shifted into building its own tools that let mobile users create documents.

Last year, Dropbox also unveiled Project Harmony, an ambitious initiative aimed at bringing more real-time updates to Microsoft Office documents that are saved in Dropbox, including the ability to see who is viewing or editing a document, and updating to new versions with one click. This past December, Dropbox made Project Harmony available for its enterprise customers.

Composer could be targeted to a number of audiences including education. Google has already been pushing its word processing service to students and schools, and Dropbox could be planning to offer an alternative. Enterprise competitor Box is also going after the business market with various tools and products.

While it’s uncertain if or when Dropbox plans to officially release Composer, it’s clear that the file-sharing company is hoping to expand beyond its roots and into areas once dominated by Microsoft Office. That market is now under assault by Google, Box, Apple, and now, probably, Dropbox.

(Correction: An early version of this story incorrectly said that users of Project Harmony would be able to use the service to collaborate in real-time. The story has been updated)

]]>http://fortune.com/2015/04/03/dropbox-google-docs/feed/0Dropbox CEO Houston speaks at TechCrunch Distrupt 2013 in San FranciscokiakokalitchevaWith a new website, Dropbox gets down to businesshttp://fortune.com/2014/07/09/dropbox-redesigns-website-enterprise/
http://fortune.com/2014/07/09/dropbox-redesigns-website-enterprise/#respondWed, 09 Jul 2014 15:00:24 +0000http://fortune.com/?p=741569]]>Dropbox, the file-hosting service, wants the world to know that it’s serious about growing its enterprise business. On Wednesday morning, the company unveiled a new website for corporate customers that eschews a white background-- it now features a colorful and textured backdrop officially dubbed “Dropbox Blue”--and places emphasis on customer use cases and features it believes enterprises care about, such as security controls and file collaboration.

"The product has evolved so much," says Ilya Fushman, head of product, business, and mobile at Dropbox. "We're putting on a strong outward face to deliver the message to customers."

The San Francisco-based company, which has now amassed 300 million users, first launched Dropbox for Business in early 2013. In recent months it has gradually added more functions for IT departments, such as the ability to remotely wipe Dropbox folders, file encryption, and two-step password verification. Fushman says a number of other features are in development, and that the company will soon release more tools that developers can use to build on top of its store and sync and share services. (Another logical next step: launching its own market for third-party enterprise applications.)

All of these advances--new website included--show Dropbox’s commitment to its largest corporate customers. Despite the company’s enormous appeal with consumers, and the fact that many customers use it in a work environment with or without their IT department’s blessing, the company is relatively new to the enterprise business. Competitors like Box, Accellion, Alfresco, and Egnyte and larger companies like Citrix CTXS and EMC EMC have targeted corporate customers for several years. Some have made considerable headway with the largest corporations: Box, for example, recently snagged a whale of a customer: General Electric GE.

The market research firm Gartner, which recently released its "Magic Quadrant" for enterprise file synchronization and sharing, classified Dropbox as a “challenger” and not a “leader.” (To be fair, it has some impressive company--other challengers in the space, according to Gartner, include Microsoft MSFT and Google GOOG.) Though millions of individuals already use Dropbox in the workplace, the company’s offering has some weaknesses when it comes to using it in an enterprise context. “Enhanced security features, such as content-aware data loss prevention, built-in DRM encryption, HIPAA and FISMA certifications are missing,” Gartner writes in a recent report.

But Dropbox’s service continues to shine in its simplicity and ease of use--a feature the company has very strategically extended from its consumer business to the enterprise side.

“The implementation of it was very, very simple and something that we found very easy to introduce to people,” says Gavin Cuneo, chief financial officer of Valiant Entertainment, a comic books publisher and Dropbox customer. “When we work with a new artist we don't have to establish any details, we can do it [get them set up on Dropbox] very quickly and very easily.”

Dropbox’s redesigned website appears to have preserved its simple appearance. (And, thankfully, doesn’t include any stock photos of random businesspeople staring at their computers.) What remains to be seen is whether or not the product can retain its ease-of-use and consumer appeal even as the company adds more functions and controls for IT administrators.

Despite an increasingly crowded space, Dropbox has a significant head start thanks to its consumer customer base. It’s a big part of the reason the company is viewed as a “challenger.” Making the leap to “leader,” though, may require more than just a signature shade of blue.

The company insists that’s just the beginning. “We want [corporate] customers to be able to use the site,” Fushman says. “But this is not just about a new website.”

Correction, July 9 2014: An earlier version of this article misstated Gartner’s categorization of Microsoft and Google. They are considered “challengers.”

The Wild East of unregulated internet usage appears to be coming to a close — in Japan, at least. At the beginning of this week, a law passed in June that made it illegal to download certain copyrighted media without permission received fangs in the shape of a potential two-year jail stretch or a fine of 2 million yen (about $25,500) for offenders.

The draconian move signals an end to the country’s largely laissez-faire approach to the internet and possibly to a culture where downloading for free has long overtaken paid for media. Japan is now one of the few OECD countries, along with South Korea, with tough penalties for copyright infringement by individuals. Japan also filters some internet content by way of its “Internet regulation bill” aimed at preventing access of “harmful” content to the under aged. Critics claim this bill is also used to censor, as Japanese ISPs are now directly answerable to the government.

The new, additional law not only ushers in an era of increased government involvement it also greatly heightens user liability says Tokyo-based technology consultant Serkan Toto. "It’s not just people who are uploading copyrighted material that are targeted; the new law also makes criminals out of people downloading such material. And the punishment, in theory, is brutal," he says. "The message here is clear — deterrent. Pay for content or you will be punished."

The law only applies to audio and visual content "knowingly" downloaded illicitly. Via a peer-to-peer program for example. While it is up to the copyright infringed to make a case. Police will not be knocking on doors demanding to see anyone’s ITunes files. But the illegal download is far and away the most popular way Japanese now collect music and ringtones according to the Recording Industry Association of Japan (RIAJ).

The association represents Japan's largest record labels and has been lobbying for years for some sort of criminalizing deterrent to dissuade illegal media downloads. It claims there are 9 illegal media downloads for every legal one in Japan. According to research RIAJ conducted in 2010, 4.36 billion music files were pirated that year, leading to 668.3 billion yen in lost earnings for its members and musicians in what is now the world's biggest market for music recordings.

RIAJ also points out that while legal downloads of digital media in Japan started to rise from a low of 35 billion yen in 2005 to 86 billion in 2010 they were only worth 72 billion yen by 2011. "The new law is a win for the media industry lobby in Japan. First and foremost the Recording Industry Association of Japan," says Toto. "The biggest issues here are, a: that every web user in Japan is now a potential target for investigation by authorities and that, b: the damage done by downloading material and the potential punishment bear no relation to each other."

RIAJ, whose company motto is "Respect our Music." welcomed the announcement in June that illegal downloads would be criminalized in October, stating on its website that such penalties are important to preserve what it calls "the cycle of music creation.” Says the association's president Naoki Kitagawa, “we hope that the revised law will reduce piracy infringement on the Internet and lead to a healthier society and net culture.”

The perception of many IP copyright holders in Japan is that Japanese regulations were too lax in the past. Japanese copyright expert, and lawyer for Creative Commons Japan, Yuko Noguchi points out that Japan is almost unique in allowing individuals until recently to hold one digital copy of just about any medium they wished.

The new law will only apply to uploaded and downloaded music and video files, while other medium, such as books, will still be permissible to copy and keep. Uploading content that infringed copyright has always been illegal in Japan, punishable by up to 10 years in prison or a fine of 10 million yen, but Noguchi questions why it is now required to go after individual copyright infringers.

“It's not necessary," she says. "Of course illegal downloading is really bad, but we have to look at those uploading and we already have those measures in place to tackle uploads. I can’t see this as a proper incentive (not to download)." YouTube and other streaming type services in Japan, although they also download content briefly onto user’s computers, will not be subject to the new rules.

So far this week there have been no reports of any arrests over illegally downloaded media in Japan although there is a government body that monitors illegal uploads in Japan. It is unknown if the same agency will be monitoring downloads as well. "It remains to be seen, how exactly the new legislation will be interpreted and how aggressively it will be enforced," says Toto.

]]>http://fortune.com/2012/10/05/law-comes-to-one-of-the-internets-wild-wests/feed/0bkrasnoveThe truth about the Rhapsody-Napster tie-uphttp://fortune.com/2011/10/04/the-truth-about-the-rhapsody-napster-tie-up/
http://fortune.com/2011/10/04/the-truth-about-the-rhapsody-napster-tie-up/#respondTue, 04 Oct 2011 13:20:46 +0000http://test-alley.fortune.com/2011/10/04/the-truth-about-the-rhapsody-napster-tie-up/]]>FORTUNE — Rhapsody is nowhere near throwing in the towel as it fights for relevance in the online music market. The paid subscription service announced Monday that it will acquire former competitor Napster.

This comes amid a newly energized marketplace for paid subscriptions in digital music. Companies in the industry have been clamoring to catch up to the European-based Spotify, the clear front-runner in the race.

Rhapsody, which pioneered the paid music business model 10 years ago, sought to capitalize on its head start in subscriptions. Right now, it is the largest amount of paid users in the U.S. "If we can grow intelligently, through acquisitions, we're going to do it," said president Jon Irwin. "It's all about extending our lead." The company also recently made a deal with Metro PCS PCS, the 6th largest wireless provider in the country, to include Rhapsody service with certain data plans.

Yesterday's deal adds Napster's several thousand members to Rhapsody's 800,000 strong subscriber base. Rhapsody will release a revised number of subscribers once the deal becomes official at the end of November, but previous reports from Napster indicate that company had several hundred thousand subscribers. Irwin declined to discuss specifics of the deal. Best Buy BBY, which acquired Napster for $122 million in cash in October 2008, will receive a minority share in Rhapsody.

The task that lies ahead for Rhapsody is making sure Napster's users transition seamlessly into Rhapsody's services. This includes integrating users' libraries, playlists and histories. "We want to make sure the Napster customers feel like they've gained something," said Irwin.

There is discrepancy between the music catalogs of the two services. Rhapsody offers some 13 million songs, while Napster tallies 15 million. Because of different label agreements, there was no direct exchange of music tracks as a part of the assets acquired in the deal. But Irwin assures that the difference is negligible. "We'll be closing that gap, once we identify those songs," he said. All of the most popular user songs are already there, he added.

Napster was the reincarnation of the free service that forced the industry to redefine its business model in 1999. After shutting down due to copyright and legal troubles, the company Roxio acquired its name and assets in 2003 and made it a paid service. The response has since been lackluster, the long-awaited putsch against Apple’s AAPL iTunes never quite materializing.

As Rhapsody and Napster join forces in trying to solve the paid subscriber conundrum, it is actually Spotify that aligns more with Napster co-founder Sean Parker's original vision. Parker, now a Spotify investor, recently reflected on his relationship with both Spotify and the original Napster: "This is actually very similar to what I dreamt of 10 years ago."

While Parker has made Spotify the flag bearer for his original cause, the veteran Rhapsody isn't backing down. The effectiveness of the merger will become known in time, but Irwin hopes that the bigger user base will allow for more visibility on social networks like Facebook. What remains to be seen is whether or not Rhapsody can rely on its almost-doubled user base to help it compete with its runaway rival.